The Form Edit Pane

The Form Edit Pane shows the layout of the form associated to the selected class and allows you to edit the form's layout. 

Components

The Form Edit Pane has the following components:

  1. The Browser Key menu, which allows you to choose the browser key for the form.
  2. The Widget Type menu, which allows you to choose a widget type for the currently selected widget, if any.
  3. A number of user-interface widgets. The currently selected widget, if any, is outlined in blue. Widgets are translated to entry fields in the Instances Tab, and control how users will enter information as instances. Each slot in the class is associated with a user-interface widget on the form. 

In addition, double-clicking on the Form Edit Pane brings up a dialog box as follows:

  1. Double-clicking on any widget brings up the Widget Configuration dialog for that widget, which allows you to view widget information and edit the widget's configuration, depending on the widget type.
  2. Double-clicking on the background of the Form Edit Pane brings up the Form Configuration dialog, which allows you to view the widget type for each widget, redisplay hidden widgets, and select which widget, if any, takes up most of the horizontal and/or vertical space as the form expands.

Default Layout

If you have not created or modified the form, Protégé-2000 uses a default layout, as follows:

  1. Widgets appear in an order based on size and type.
  2. Each widget is a standard type, based on the slot's type and cardinality.
  3. Each widget is a standard size for that widget type.
The layout that you create in the Form Edit Pane appears in the Instances Form. Users use the form to enter knowledge into the knowledge base as instances.

The example below shows the default form for Newspaper, which has 4 slots. There are 3 different slot-value types and both single and mutliple cardinality slots. 

 

You can use the Form Edit Pane to design an interface which allows easy entry of the disparate types of information represented by the different types of slots. 

There are a number of basic editing tools provided on the Form Edit Pane. Some of the actions you can perform with widgets are:

  1. Moving widgets to a different location and/or resize them.

  2. Hiding or redisplaying a widget.

  3. Selecting a different type of widget from the Select Widget Type menu.

  4. For widgets with buttons, choosing which buttons are displayed.

Note: It is also possible to create customized widgets using the programmer's interface.

You can also make changes to the global properties of the form, including:

  1. Selecting a browser key, which is used to identify the different instances when they are displayed in a list. 

  2. Selecting a single widget that will expand to take up most of the form, rather than having all widgets resize proportionally.


Next: The Browser Key Menu

Forms Table of Contents